Speech evaluation after palatal augmentation in patients undergoing glossectomy.
OBJECTIVE
To assess, in patients undergoing glossectomy, the influence of the palatal augmentation prosthesis on the speech intelligibility and acoustic spectrographic characteristics of the formants of oral vowels in Brazilian Portuguese, specifically the first 3 formants (F1 [/a,e,u/], F2 [/o,ó,u/], and F3 [/a,ó/]).


METHODS
Speech evaluation with and without a palatal augmentation prosthesis using blinded randomized listener judgments.


METHODS
Tertiary referral center.


METHODS
Thirty-six patients (33 men and 3 women) aged 30 to 80 (mean [SD], 53.9 [10.5]) years underwent glossectomy (14, total glossectomy; 12, total glossectomy and partial mandibulectomy; 6, hemiglossectomy; and 4, subtotal glossectomy) with use of the augmentation prosthesis for at least 3 months before inclusion in the study.


METHODS
Spontaneous speech intelligibility (assessed by expert listeners using a 4-category scale) and spectrographic formants assessment.


RESULTS
We found a statistically significant improvement of spontaneous speech intelligibility and the average number of correctly identified syllables with the use of the prosthesis (P < .05). Statistically significant differences occurred for the F1 values of the vowels /a,e,u/; for F2 values, there was a significant difference of the vowels /o,ó,u/; and for F3 values, there was a significant difference of the vowels /a,ó/ (P < .001).


CONCLUSIONS
The palatal augmentation prosthesis improved the intelligibility of spontaneous speech and syllables for patients who underwent glossectomy. It also increased the F2 and F3 values for all vowels and the F1 values for the vowels /o,ó,u/. This effect brought the values of many vowel formants closer to normal.
de Carvalho-Teles
Viviane
V
Rehabilitation Department, Fundação Oncocentro de São Paulo, 2396, Oscar Freire, São Paulo, Brazil 05409-012. vivicarvalhofono@yahoo.com.br
Sennes
Luiz Ubirajara
LU
Gielow
Ingrid
I
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001184:Articulation Disorders / Q000209:etiology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D001938:Brazil; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D005927:Glossectomy / Q000009:adverse effects / Q000379:methods / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011336:Probability; D011474:Prosthesis Design; D019919:Prosthesis Implantation; D011788:Quality of Life; D019651:Plastic Surgery Procedures / Q000379:methods / Q000534:rehabilitation; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D018570:Risk Assessment; D013065:Speech Intelligibility; D013068:Speech Production Measurement; D013070:Speech Therapy / Q000379:methods*; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D014062:Tongue Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery*; D016896:Treatment Outcome